Thursday, September 17, 2009

Rain, rain rain..

Ethan is now 9 and a half months old. We had a fun filled summer. Lots of pool time, spending time with family and a fun 5 day trip to Florida with the girls and babies. On that trip, Ethan popped his 6th tooth and just about gave up his pacifier. He still takes it occasionally, but he prefers the real thing :) It did help get through those rough colicky months though, and popping 3 teeth in like 3 weeks or something. He's eating 3 meals a day (usually sweet potatoes, peas, banana, meat, some kind of cheese or yogurt, kiwi, avocado and green beans makes up his meals) I occasionally give him brown rice and brown rice pasta, but only occasionally. I don't want to overload his system with grains.

Despite the rain, I love this time of year. It starts to get a little cool outside (by cool I mean low to mid 70's) and it's now okay to make soups a regular part of the weekly meal plan(I love soup all year round, but Mark think's it's wrong unless it's cool outside). My garden is starting to take form. I now have basil, coriander(?), green beans, cucumbers, and jalapenos. I grew some tomatoes over the summer and one plant did well, the other did not. We also tried to plant blueberry bushes and they just never took off. Hopefully now that I have a rainbarrel catchment, I will keep up with the watering more frequently and save water while doing it!

We're having such a hard time not totally going overboard on toys and clothes for Ethan. He so doesn't need any clothes. Everyone I know lately has had boys so I've gotten lots of hand-me-downs, which also helps justify buying the "Happy Father's Day" onesie, "Happy 4th of July" onesie, and halloween pajamas..oh and a halloween t-shirt that glows in the dark :) We also just bought him a cool truck by this company called Sprig. It's all recycled and eco-friendly materials. I love cool unique toys, something that no one else has.

I've been really getting into cooking lately as well. Since last summer, I've grown to love the farmer's market and coop sharing. The Movement Dallas is the coop that my mom, sister and I are a part of, and they are now offering salmon, bison, and local, organic produce in addition to the raw milk, cheese, yogurt, chickens, eggs, beef and pork. I swear, I think I could live off of this coop and never go to the grocery store. My hubby wouldn't go for that though :) He likes his boxed cereal and chips and salsa too much. I've been trying to make sure that I order at least one or two kinds of meat each week so that we pretty much only eat sustainable, organic meat. I was getting so excited about Ethan being able to have milk products soon, because I strongly believe that raw milk is very healthy, but I think he's sensitive to it. Maybe he's just not ready for it yet, and in time, his body can tolerate it. I don't even know if that's it, but he's had an ear infection and has just been generally fussy and gassy for weeks now. I got all the dairy out of his diet (including butter in my cooking) and he's seemed a bit better in the past few days, so we'll see.

And on to food! Tonight I made wild alaskan salmon(packaged on the boat, frozen the whole way, so you know it's fresh). I cut open the vacuum-sealed package, and all I could smell was the sea. It was so nice to not be overwhelmed with a strong fishy smell. All I did was put some salt and pepper on it, and placed it skin side down in a cast iron skillet in some olive oil and cooked it till it flaked. Then, squeezed some lemon juice over it. I served it with sautéed bok choy, which had some chopped garlic, olive oil, salt, pepper and lemon juice. A scoop of brown rice finished out the plate. It was so amazingly simple and delicious. Tomorrow I'm going to make bison chili, with soaked red beans and some cocoa powder (don't knock it till you've tried it!)

Work has been insanely busy lately, but in a good way. I like knowing that I can go to work and there will be plenty to do. Tuesdays are a bit crazy though. I split working and babysitting with my sister on Tuesday. My day starts at 7 am. I get up, get Ethan ready, make breakfast, get my pump ready, diaper bag packed, lunch and water packed, and head to my sister's. I have to be there by 8:45 at the latest. Either Shelley or I take the early shift to work and the other works in the afternoon. So for four hours, I watch 4 kids. We have a lot of fun in these 4 hours and I'm so glad that my little boy gets to play with his cousins at least once a week, usually more. Today, I took them all to Brilliant Sky, a kid's toy and bookstore in Highland Village. They carry all the unique toys that you don't see everywhere. You'll see brands like Melissa and Doug, Alex, Learning Toys, Edushape, Sprig, Playsilks, etc. I love it because they have a remote control train table, a marble game and other toys that kids can play with there while their parents look around. It seems like there's something for every age group to play with. We left there and it started to rain. So, we piled in the van and went an picked up lunch for my sister and mom, then drove to the studio, and when Shelley and I were doing the trade-off, Shelley stood in the rain while I got my stuff together. Addison came up with me and hung out while I worked. Actually, she was a big help. She tagged and bagged jewelry, and helped keep my boss's little boy entertained for a bit. After work ended at 6, I headed over to get Ethan, and went home to make dinner. Then there was dishes, and Mark bathed Ethan while I worked on my brother's website for a little bit. Got Ethan down to bed, and now I have some alone time. I love busy days like this, but let me just say, I'm glad it's only one day a week!! Well, that's all I got for today. I'll try to blog again soon. HA HA. right. It's been 4 months since the last post. Let's just be honest, it will probably be another 4 before I post again.